Tapioca Pudding

Ingredients

• 5 tbsp tapioca
• 1 quart milk
• 2 oz butter
• 1 cup sugar
• 4 eggs
• vanilla or bitter almond flavouring

Method

Soak the tapioca in cold water for 30 minutes to soften the granules evenly — this prevents them from clumping when they hit the hot milk. Drain well. Heat the milk to 75°C (just steaming, not boiling) and add the drained tapioca, stirring constantly for the first minute to break any clots. Move the pan to the back of the stove and maintain a gentle simmer. Stir every few minutes. The tapioca will become translucent at the edges within 10 minutes; you're done when the granules are fully clear and the mixture coats the spoon thickly — roughly 15–20 minutes total. The heat gelatinises the starch, thickening the dairy base without curdling.

Cool the mixture to hand-temperature before proceeding. This matters: adding beaten eggs to hot tapioca will scramble them. Whisk the eggs with a pinch of salt until pale and thick, then fold them into the cooled tapioca along with the softened butter (cut into small pieces so it incorporates smoothly), caster sugar, and your flavouring of choice — vanilla extract is the gentler option; bitter almond (amaretto or almond extract) gives a more assertive edge. Fold gently to preserve airiness from the eggs.

Transfer to a buttered baking dish. Bake at 160°C for 50–60 minutes. The pudding is set when a knife inserted near the centre comes out with a faint jiggle in the middle — the carryover heat will finish the cooking as it cools. A rigid pudding means the eggs have tightened; you've overshot. The top will be pale gold and may have a slight skin.

For a boiled pudding instead: use 7 tablespoons of tapioca and proceed as above. Pour into a buttered pudding basin, cover tightly with foil or a cloth, and steam in a bain-marie (the water should reach halfway up the basin's side) for 90 minutes. Top up the water every 30 minutes — the steam, not direct heat, cooks this version slowly and uniformly. Turn out onto a warm plate to serve. Either method yields a soft, almost custard-like interior — the baking version slightly firmer, the boiled version more delicate.